San Diego now has a new state-of-the-art public health lab, ready to detect and respond to the next epidemic outbreak.
“We designed the space for how we wanted it,” lab director Jeremy Corrigan said at the lab's grand opening on Thursday.
At 52,000 square feet, the $93 million lab in Kearny Mesa is nearly three times bigger than the old lab in Point Loma. Corrigan said the bigger space means the county can test more samples, with quicker results for faster treatment.
“In the past, we might have had to send samples out to CPDH (California Department of Public Health) or CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention)," Corrigan said, noting the turnaround time for results could be "weeks to months."
Now with the local lab, he said, the turnaround time is days.
The bigger space also allows the lab to grow as needed.
"This laboratory is designed for sustainability and to support our public health operations for the next 40 to 50 years," Corrigan said. "And we're in really great shape for that."
New at this lab is genomic sequencing, which lets researchers identify a pathogen’s unique genetic markers to determine where a disease outbreak came from or if there are multiple outbreaks.
Corrigan said it's an early warning system "to diagnose patients quicker, to prevent the spread of outbreaks and disesases.”
The new facility is also a biosafety level-3 lab, which means it can test for lethal pathogens such as anthrax and ricin. But most importantly, this facility allows the county some independence from the CDC.
Corrigan said public health is local first.
“We are in control of what our priorities are," he said. "And so this is why I’m able to stand up and bring any kind of testing that our community needs, and I don’t have to go through other permissions to do so.”
In March, the Trump administration rescinded funding for the lab just as it was nearly complete.
Corrigan said the federal funding was restored and the lab was completed in time for Thursday's opening.
